Eclectic Views

    
   Privacy? On The Internet?

Big brouhaha over Facebook telling your friends what you bought on other
sites:  http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/30/technology/30face.html
 and
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/29/the-evolution-of-facebooks-beacon/
  

    
Yep. Also in the Web conf here, in the Facebook topic.
  

    

   Poof!

From  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/technology/7138103.stm

"Exodus to virtual worlds predicted

The appeal of online virtual worlds such as Second Life is such that it may
trigger an exodus of people seeking to 'disappear from reality,' an expert
on large-scale online games has said."
  

    

   Googlepedia

Google is reported at
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/15/technology/15web.html
to be thinking of building a for-profit rival to Wikipedia. Known as "Knol"
(as in knowledge), it would let users build a Web page on any subject which
they could allow Google to place ads on and share the revenue. This raises
conflict of interest issues with Google's search engine that don't seem to
be addressed at this early stage of development. Unlike Wiki, only the
author of the page could edit it, and "competing pages on the same topic"
are possible.
  

    

That's an interesting idea. We'll see how well that model works out
in practice.
  

    

   Software Gets Hard

An article in today's NY Times at
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/17/technology/17chip.html

discusses the programming challenges posed by multiple-core CPUs, such as
breaking down tasks for parallel processing. They are expected to grow as
two- and four-processor chips expand to include dozens of cores and traffic
management intrudes on the original problem-solving issue. It also features
a photo of the Well's <clm>.
  

    

   Just Like Old Times

A company has sued IBM for monopolistic practices. Software maker Platform
Solutions alleges in a complaint to the European Commission that IBM has
"abused its market dominance by refusing to share information related to its
high-performance mainframe computers". I see a courtroom crowded with the
ghosts of Telex, CDC, Burroughs, Univac, ...
  

    
An interesting article on the culture and demographics of Silicon Valley in
today's NY Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/20/technology/20cluster.html

Learn why "The cricket pitch...is a good place to scout recruits or learn of
job openings".
  

    
Goodbye, 2007...